Interview Lea Ryan Author of Wild Spirits of the Hollow
Pull up a chair, grab a drink of your choice from the cooler, a Chocolate Chip or Peanut Butter cookie from the plate, and let’s find out a little about Lea and her Wild Spirits of the Hollow.
What secret do you use to blast through writer’s block?
I plot my stories out pretty meticulously, so I don’t get much writer’s block. If I do get stuck, I find that it’s because I didn’t think that scene through in enough detail to begin with. I step back, reassess the notes, and figure out where to go from there. When it does happen, it’s usually a matter of figuring out how to get from one point to another in a way that flows. Staying in that document, staring at the blinking cursor does not help!
What inspired you to write?
My love of books is definitely what inspired me to write. I was a huge bookworm as a kid. I tend to want to imitate what I love. I love fantasy and paranormal fiction, any story that removes me from the real world. And that’s what I write. I love that anything can happen in those kinds of stories. Those worlds are way more exciting than my office job, for sure!
Where do your story ideas come from? If they come to you in the middle of the night, do you get up and write them all down?
My ideas come from many places. I keep notes on things that I think are cool or interesting. They might come from television, movies, random tidbits I see on the internet. Sometimes, I might be driving and see something that gives me an idea that connects to another idea. A book or a story usually isn’t one idea; it’s more like a bunch of ideas strung together in some (hopefully) coherent form.
What do you like to do when you are not writing?
When I’m not writing or hanging out with the fam, I spend way too much time on the PlayStation. My game of the moment is Elder Scrolls Online (ESO). Earlier this year it was Destiny 2 and a little bit of Uncharted 4, which I still need to finish. My primary on ESO is a Khajiit, and I’m currently at level 460ish. Oh, and Fallout 4. I’m still picking that one up on and off. My son plays that one as well. We are both looking forward to Fallout 76.
How about a sneak peek between the pages of Wild Spirits of the Hollow?I stood at the edge of the trees, staring at the light deep within the forest. Between it and me, a sea of shadow concealed the underbrush and all that lurked there. This forest, like many other forests, would have its insects, snakes, tangles of who-knew-what, maybe wildcats or some other thing ready to pounce on and maim me.After hours of walking along a secluded, mountain highway, my brain was thoroughly scrambled. I knew enough to know that, and I knew enough to not fully trust what I was seeing.
It might be a lie, the light, a mirage conjured by some desperate part of my mind. I’d told enough lies to others, why not myself?
A fantasy of stumbling upon a cabin with friendly occupants swam through my mind. They’d have food left over from dinner, a plate they’d be happy to hand over to someone who really needed it, and I did really need it. Lunch was a distant memory, as well as the Skittles from my backpack, my bottle of water. If I made it anywhere alive, I would really have to reevaluate my packing priorities.
I sighed. Unless I wanted to sleep next to the highway, that light was my only hope. I adjusted my backpack straps and stepped into the trees.
I plodded through the darkness in high tops that weren’t made for terrain any more intense than a mall floor. I also regretted wearing shorts and a t-shirt because there was no trail, only weeds and trees and rustling sounds made by small animals nearby.
All the while, the light in the distance remained bright, burning my eyes, but I kept my sights on it because that was hope, even if it never seemed to get any closer.
I kept my mind off my creepy surroundings by considering who I would be for the people who awaited me. Had someone picked me up as I attempted to hitchhike, that lucky individual would’ve had the opportunity to hang out with a model, who was on her way to Miami.
Everybody likes to hang out with famous people and people who are about to be famous. I’ve noticed this before. When I tell them whatever version of the story I’d concocted for the evening, their eyes would light up as if I had offered to take them along to fame and fortune.
The model story was my go-to. I was lanky and odd looking in a way that some people found attractive or interesting, at the very least, plausible model material. This was not the person I would be in the cabin. I didn’t have the energy to keep up the behaviors that went along with that lie.
Models didn’t eat substantial food. Models ate iceberg lettuce and drank lemon, cucumber water. My model did, anyway.
There in the woods with possible food ahead of me, there was no way I could keep that up. I didn’t care what food someone shoved under my nose. The idea of grilled opossum made my mouth water. Boiled weeds? Fine. I’d eat anything.
I tried to come up with another story, but the most compelling at that moment was my own. Broken car. Girl wandering the woods in hope of finding food and shelter. I was filthy and growing filthier by the minute. If I had scissors in my backpack, I would’ve chopped off at least half of my long, brown hair just to get rid of the tangles. That evening, I wouldn’t have to fake a look of utter desperation. So I let the story be what it was.
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Posted in Authors' Secrets Blog and tagged Contemporary, fantasy, fiction, Lea Ryan, Supernatural, Wild Spirits of the Hollow by Tena Stetler with 2 comments.
Clean, Organize & Reviews-Not For Faint of Heart
Last weekend was clean, organize and as it turned out reviews. First up carpet cleaning, scrubbing the stairs is the worst! Wouldn’t you know it, the pump on the carpet cleaner quit. The darn thing was only 13 years old. Previous years, my husband had replaced the motor, belts and spin heads. This time, it was DOA without hope of resurrection. Should have been a great excuse to go to the next task on my to-do list, but the stairs were soaked with pre-cleaner. A quick search on the internet, I found the exact make and model I wanted. Even better it was on sale in a store located close to my neighborhood. Armed with the new cleaner, we knocked the stairs out in no time, leaving the last two rooms for this week.
Then cleaning and organizing my inventory of books and swag for 2018 appearances. I inherited a wonderful large Lane cedar chest and decided it was perfect for consolidating my book inventory in one place. As I finished up, hidden among the books I’d written was a book that I had not written but enjoyed reading. It had a sticky note on it “Review due April 16, 2018”. Oh crap, somehow I’d forgotten to review the book I read a few weeks ago. Reviews are so important to authors because: Writing and sharing a book review is a benefit for the writing and reading community. You help like-minded readers discover a great book and you help the author by providing valuable feedback. Also your words are as important to an author as an author’s words are to you. How so you ask? Those words may seem counterintuitive to you if you are a reader, but in our data-driven age, book reviews left by readers on Amazon.com and Goodreads can 
make a huge difference in the success of an author, especially emerging and mid-list authors like me who aren’t getting their books reviewed in The New York Times. Yet. LOL
Reasons why reader’s reviews really help authors. In fact they are vital! Author Lauren Faulkenberry breaks it down like this:
- The number of reviews helps authors get into promotional gold mines like the Bookbub Newsletter who has all but said, you must have so many Amazon reviews or we won’t even consider listing your book. I’ve no idea why this is the case, but that’s the way it is.
- Word on the street is that reviews help push our rankings on Amazon. Visibility, so important.
- Reviews make it easier for authors to get their books into indie bookstores. (Did you know local bookstores or libraries stocking your book is hardly ever a given?)
So now you know why authors are asking politely for your review. Your review doesn’t have to be long, a few words like “great book” and a 4 or 5 star rating. If you don’t like the book, don’t leave a review, ’nuff said. Putting my soapbox back under the bed.
Click on cover to read more or purchase
Okay, time for a shameless plug for one of my favorite books. A VAMPIRE’S UNLIKELY ALLIANCE–Not what you’ve come to expect from a Vampire Tale! Leave your ordinary world behind, be swept away into a Romantic fantasy with Brandy and Stefan add just a touch of mystery and suspense for your Monday. Grab your copy today! http://a.co/gwldy2P
Friday an interview with Melody Johnson Author of Day Reaper will grace these pages. You don’t want to miss it!
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Posted in Authors' Secrets Blog and tagged Authors, fantasy, fiction, Nonfiction, Paranormal, Readers, Reviews, Romance by Tena Stetler with 2 comments.
Interview Frederick L. Malphurs Author of Dr. Fox
Give a warm welcome to Frederick L. Malphurs, author of A Year in the Life of Dr. Fox.
Pull up a chair, grab a drink of your choice from the cooler, a Chocolate Chip or Peanut Butter cookie from the plate, and let’s find out a little about Frederick L. Malphurs and his book A Year In the Life of Dr. Fox.
What defines you as an author? As a person? Are they one in the same? I am interested in nearly everything: people, places, situations, issues. Probably the same thing that defines me as an author is true of me as a person.
What inspired this particular story? As a child I watched the Disney television series, later as an adult, in El Fuerte, Mexico, in the hotel courtyard there was a nearly full size statue of Zorro which instantly rekindled my interest in Zorro and in writing a novel on same which as the original Zorro is trademarked protected, the story had to move away from the television and movie Zorro and it did.
What secret do you use to blast through writer’s block? I am lucky in that I have not experienced writer’s block, at least as I understand it. I am more on the opposite side, writing away on stuff that will need to be heavily edited or placed in a deep pending file.
Who is your favorite character of all of the books you’ve written and Why? Meanie Mouse. We need a woman superhero who isn’t bulletproof and uses her intellect and personal sense of right and wrong to at least try to make things right.
What inspired you to write? A lot of reading, probably, and then something popped inside my head.
How long have you been writing? In my first career as a health care manager and then executive, I wrote a lot of business related stuff: memos, case studies, investigations, reports, etc. But, that job was so demanding, I had little time to write fiction, I would start, have to stop, and months might go by before I got back to it.
Did you tell friends and family that you were writing a book? Or did it take a while to come out and tell friends and family you were a writer? I was totally open about it.
Do you see yourself in your characters? Yes, health care management and a mostly disfunctional family life while growing up gave me a lot of characters, a daily view of behavioral health issues, the variation of the human experience and intellect, etc. which I realized was a rich source of material for writing.
What do you want your readers to take away from your books? That reading my books was worth the experience. Then maybe, some reflection on what things are as they are and how society could be improved.
Where do your story ideas come from? If they come to you in the middle of the night, do you get up and write them all down? From my life experiences, my dreams are mostly about missed airplane connections, late to meetings, and that sort of thing. Many years ago, I tried to wake up and write down ideas that occurred to me in the middle of the night. Those notes invariably were jibberish, which I suppose is a sign of the state of my mind during the night.
If writing is your first passion, what is your second? Physical fitness. After a lifetime of work which involved multiple meetings on a daily basis, raising a family, and running for airplanes, physical fitness did not get done, so now I go to the gym four or five times a week, most of the time.What do you like to do when you are not writing? Reading, some travel, watching major sports events such as Gator football and basketball games, the Masters, the Superbowl, etc.
You’ve got a time machine, a cloak of invisibility, and one hour. Where would you go, and what eavesdropping would you do? I would go to the White House, any President, wander around, and most importantly try to listen to every word.
A Peek Between the Page of A Year in the Life of Dr. Fox.
An Untimely Arrest, January 5
Father Teodoro de la Vega was sitting in an ancient wooden swivel chair, working on revisions to his doctoral thesis Methodism in America, when he heard the soft buzzing of his cell phone. He picked up the phone, swiveling his chair around before he spoke to look out the high tiny window in his cramped office at the far end of the Culiacan Cathedral. “This is Father De La Vega.”
“This is Lieutenant Flores of the federal police. We are trying to notify the family of Diego Sanchez. He has you listed as the family contact.”
Father Teodoro’s eyes stayed fixed on the fronds of the tall palm tree growing in the cathedral’s backyard. “Yes, I am Diego’s brother-in-law. How can I help?”
“I am sorry to inform you that your sister’s husband, Diego Sanchez, was arrested this morning and is currently being held in custody in Culiacan prison.” The lieutenant sounded subdued, deferential to the Catholic priest, sympathetic.
Father Teo was silent for several moments. “Oh my God, this is a shock. My sister was kidnapped three days ago, on January 2. She and Diego have three young children, and now this.” Father Teo sighed deeply and made the sign of the cross.
“I know about the kidnapping. I am so sorry. It seems your family is suddenly confronting great adversity. I can assure you that all the police agencies are working diligently to find your sister.”
Father Teo took several deep breaths before responding. “Would it be possible for me to go see Diego now?”
Lieutenant Flores was silent a moment. “Yes, under the circumstances, I’m sure there must be many arrangements to be made for the children. I will contact the prison and get your visit authorized.”
Father Teo stood up, suddenly feeling dazed; his jaw clenched as his eyes riveted on the small statue of Jesus he kept on his desk. “I am on my way to the prison now.” He next forced himself to call his brother, Eduardo, and their father, Alfonso. He quickly concluded each call with “I’ll call you back as soon as I learn anything.”
Father Teo quickly jogged down the hall and across the cathedral campus to his car. Outside, he stood beside his car and gazed upward for several moments, praying for his sister, Diego, and their children. Then he got into his battered Toyota and headed to the prison.
Father Teo sat in the visitors’ waiting room for thirty minutes before the guards escorting Diego burst through the door on the prisoners’ side.
They pushed Diego ahead of them and roughly shoved him into a chair. One of them said, “Sit down and shut up!” to Diego and waved a finger under Diego’s nose. Father Teo moved quickly to the cubicle opposite Diego and sat on the hard plastic chair in the narrow enclosure.
“Teo, tell me about my family.” Diego was somber and seemed to have physically shrunk since the last time Teo had seen him only three days before.
Diego’s usual state of casual good humor had been replaced with a pallid and tense facial expression. His eyes were tearing and moved only indirectly in the direction of Father Teo; he could not maintain eye contact for more than a moment. His eyes, now dark and sunken, slowly roamed the brightly lit room: floor, walls, ceiling, Father Teo.
“We have had no contact with Tina’s kidnappers. We are doing everything we can to find her. Eduardo and I are moving heaven and earth to find her.
The kids miss her and are understandably upset. How are you?”
“I am depressed as hell. I’m scared out of my mind. I am so grateful to you and Eduardo.” Diego dipped his head and nervously checked the position of the guards. “Please do everything you can to get these charges dropped and get me out of here somehow.”
“Of course you are depressed. Anyone would be in these circumstances.
My father is talking to lawyers right now. Your arrest has come as a complete shock to all of us.”
“I am embarrassed and stunned by my arrest too, Teo. Please tell my mother and the children that I love them, but I do not want them to come here. Seeing me in this place will only make things worse for them. Have you learned anything about the charges against me?”
Father Teo chewed on his lip. He hesitated while a myriad of happy family memories flooded his thinking: Diego and Tina’s wedding, the births of their three children, and many family gatherings. “You are accused and charged with consorting with narco-criminals by laundering their illegal earnings, aiding the cartel’s hit men by providing them with shelter, engaging in a criminal conspiracy, and accepting financial assistance from the Pacific cartel. I’m still in shock, Diego. I don’t understand this. Is any of it true?”
Diego squirmed in his seat and dropped his head to the Formica countertop of the little booth. “Oh my god,” he said this loudly, and the nearest prisoners on Diego’s side of the barrier turned in his direction. When he sat back up straight, his hands clutched his heart. Tears rolled down his cheeks.
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Posted in Authors' Secrets Blog and tagged Adventure, Dr. Fox, fiction, Frederick L. Malphurs, Thriller by Tena Stetler with 3 comments.
Elizabeth Alsobrooks Author of Stolen Secrets
Give a big welcome to Elizabeth Alsobrooks, author of Stolen Secrets. Have a seat and grab an insulated mug. I’ve got hot chocolate, hot cider and coffee. Choose your pot, they’re labeled. Pick your choice of a Snicker-doodle, Chocolate Chip or Peanut butter cookie from the plate. Yep, I baked them myself. Lets find out about Elizabeth and Stolen Secrets. Thanks for joining us! Psst…. Don’t forget to enter the Rafflecopter at the bottom of this post for a $10.00 GC.
Elizabeth tell us what inspired this particular story?
Stolen Secrets is a romance spinoff from my Illuminati (Urban Fantasy) series, so is much more character driven and oriented than what is usual for me. It’s steamier, of course, and the hero is hot, hot, hot, if I do say so myself. Here is who I pictured when writing this:
Here’s how it begins:
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Posted in Authors' Secrets Blog and tagged fantasy, fiction, Illuminati, Jinn, mashup, Paranormal, Romance by Tena Stetler with 5 comments.
